


The Museum at the Centre of the Universe

by navaan



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Community: wintercompanion, M/M, Romance, Time Travel, Timey-Wimey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2016-07-31
Packaged: 2018-07-19 15:46:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7367746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/pseuds/navaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a museum at the centre of the universe that shelters more than just artefacts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Museum at the Centre of the Universe

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Wintercompanion Summer/Winter Holidays Prompt #4:42 cycles/Deneb/clock winder/museum and obviously the moving objects are inspired by Darvill's Doctor... I mean, by Legends of Tomorrow. [This fic was first published here.](http://wintercompanion.livejournal.com/255664.html)
> 
> You can also read this story and comment on it on Livejournal [here](http://navaan.livejournal.com/291270.html). Feel free to friend or contact me there.

Jack likes the museum. It has 124 rooms and some of them move around like the inside of a Tardis. Not all of them are open to the public and those aren't are full with stuff that's too dangerous to be on display. There are the rooms of the special exhibitions that change all the time. Many locals come to see those and it's easy to mingle unseen, get in touch with people and learn their stories. These days he likes that. It's easy to lose touch when you're as old as he is. There are also the rooms of the permanent exhibition and he knows every exhibit in every room like it's an old friend, knows the placement of every single object like the back of his hand.

Many objects here belonged to him at one time or another. Some belonged to friends and some just ended up here by accident. He has some favourites. There is the Venusian ceremonial cup he'd been given when he'd vacationed with the Doctor and had become part of an energy ritual, and a rococo bed he had sex in with three different Royals at the same time, and there is a 63rd century credit chip that Rose had given him when they'd been in trouble on Tezztra VI, and finally there is also the teacup that Ianto Jones bought him years back as a gift. He still remembers all of those moments fondly. He has a whole room of things that were saved from the different Torchwood agencies he'd worked with over the centuries.

Some people ask what the rectangular shape on the floor of the 36th room is for, because most of them have never seen an exhibit standing there.

That's because that particular exhibit is only there for a few minutes every few years and usually the only one who notices the big blue police box is Jack himself.

He walks along some of the glass cases and recalls every single object he finds there. He's not checking for dust. He's watching for changes. There's a 14th century armor that stands in the wrong place; not in the corner beside the door, but to the south wall between two windows. There's an old car that has just slightly changed position. A stack of Roman coins that had been neatly arranged is scattered.

He smiles to himself. “Doctor, Doctor, you've been busy again.”

But none of that is really out of the ordinary. It's just the small changes that reverberate through time and get back to his little future museum at the centre of the universe when somewhere out there time is changed. That's why he chose this place. People don't notice, but inside of this museum, time is different.

The Dalek data core that used to sit in the case of Dalek War memorabilia isn't singed anymore, but is cut in half. There is a Louis Quatorze chair that has changed places. And there's an Ood ceremonial headdress, that's only been here for ten years or so, that has some new ornaments.

Nothing to worry about there. His time traveller is just busy.

The Doctor always is.

He stops for a moment when he reaches a piece of the Berlin wall that has “Bad Wolf” sprayed across it and is hanging right beside a similar graffiti from Herculaneum and a poster from a Bargonian war memorial, that is called “Bad Wolf” in the planet's language. Good old Rose. His days with Rose and the Doctor were still among the happiest in his long, long memory, and he gathers all sorts of reminders when he can.

Most nights, this is where his contemplation ends. Happy that there's no sign of any destruction, trouble or of time dissolving at the edges, he then retires to his own room. The Doctor is running around the universe leaving his mark, but not in a bad way. Jack Harkness can rest easy.

So once again, he's about to walk up the stairs and settle in for a quiet night, when he hears a loud clink of something metallic falling to the floor. It's coming from the room to his left and it's only a few steps to walk over.

It's the clock winder.

It has fallen on the floor.

In the middle of the room.

Usually it lies three floors up on his office desk.

He moves over and picks it up, inspecting it from all sides. But there is no mark, no visible change to the clock winder itself. With slower steps he walks over to the Gallifreyan grandfather clock in the corner. The winder has shifted here to this room for a reason, and Jack can only think of one.

Most visitors have no clue that this clock is indeed the heart piece of his little museum. This clock is what phases the building slightly out of the present time, what makes his museum a time vault more than an actual museum. It is a beacon in the Vortex with a physical form on planet as disguise. It draws some of the objects here just by existing.

The clock winder fits perfectly as always and Jack starts to wind, but the clock has gotten stuck and the winder doesn't move even when he pushes hard. Uneasy at the changes piling up suddenly, he opens the case to look. A piece of paper is stuck in the clockwork.

He pulls. In scrawly letters a timecode is giving a time and coordinates. Right here. Inside the Museum. In a few minutes. “Picking you up at ten,” is written beneath it. “Time for a holiday, Jack.”

He huffs.

Indeed it is.

There’s time to walk down to that room with that particularly squarish shaped free space without an exhibit at a leisurely pace. He hears the Tardis before he even rounds the corner. 

The Doctor, wearing sunglasses and holding a guitar, sticks his head out the door. “Hurry up then, we don’t have all day.”

“I do,” Jack says with a grin.

“You’ve spent too much time outside of space and time, my dear. Time to get you back in the game.”

He wriggles his eyebrows. “Convince me?”

The Doctor rolls his eyes. “I know just the thing. We can dance all night.”

“Promises,” he says airily and grins, as he steps into the Tardis, ready for a new adventure.

His museum will still be here when he gets back and he'll have a few more pieces to add to his collection. “Did you have a recent run in with the Daleks?”

“Me?” The Doctor looks at him somewhere between disinterested and innocent and Jack knows the answer is a clear “yes, of course!”

“Tell me all about it.”

“Don’t you want to dance?”

“Oh, Doctor, you used to be less easy. How about this time you buy _me_ a drink first?”

The Doctor shakes his head and sighs, not in the least amused.

But somewhere in the museum a painting of the Great Deneb Battle changes into a bright landscape painting and in another room a table breaks in two, from the invisible pressure of too much dancing having been done on its surface, just as the Tardis whooshes away to the Vortex and towards all the adventures that for other people have already happened.

**Author's Note:**

> You can also find me on [tumblr ](http://navaan.tumblr.com/). This fic has a post [on there](http://navaan.tumblr.com/post/148266259574/fanfiction-doctor-who-the-museum-at-the-centre) in case you want to comment/review/reblog there. [My ask box](http://navaan.tumblr.com/ask) is open if you have questions.


End file.
